Who is John Myrick?
John Myrick was born in Kansas City, Missouri and raised in El Paso, Texas. After a super brief college football stint at UTEP ended by a knee injury, he found himself on the El Paso set of Walter Hill’s Last Man Standing, where Christopher Walken praised his ability to convincingly lie dead on a cold, icy car in the desert. John took this as a sign, the cinema gods were calling!
He enrolled into the Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, making dozens of emotionally shallow short films and attending film festivals. At one screening, his film print literally combusted in the projector. The audience applauded. John cried. Both reactions were correct.
Do you remember the exact moment you fell in love with cinema?
I was probably exposed to movies a little too young in the 1980’s, thanks to at home cable channels like HBO, Showtime, and Cinemax. One summer it felt like Conan the Barbarian, Mad Max, The Road Warrior, Star Wars, Superman, Jaws, and Animal House were playing on an endless loop. I was just a kid, but I was completely hooked.
In the 1990s, a “guru-type” guy at my local video store told me I had to watch Reservoir Dogs. Back when video store employees had their own curated sections, that recommendation hit hard. The commode story, Tim Roth rehearsing it, then the cut to him performing it in front of the mobsters felt like a flash of brain lightning! That was the moment I realized cinema had a much bigger canvas than I’d imagined, and I was drawn to it.
Tell us about your project “Impacted”.
I walk my two pit-mix rescue dogs, Riggins and Stevie, every morning, usually in Santa Barbara or West Hollywood. One June morning during our signature fog, I was walking them on the beach with almost no visibility. The ocean was completely still and quiet, and it felt like a black-and-white Twilight Zone set. I remember thinking: what if I stumbled onto something strange out here? I was totally alone except for the dogs.
That image stuck with me and became the seed of a short story about a man with a film camera shooting b-roll who captures something unsettling under lonely, low-visibility conditions (The Sanchez Film). From there, the idea expanded into the A-story: a local access TV program called Impacted—”the best cinema appreciation show on local access”—that takes on the restoration of the old black-and-white footage. Thanks to our local sponsors (my real-life SB friends Boss Hoss Barbeque and Wise Acres Winery and a special nod to Pump and Dump, a parody of a local septic pumping company with Disney-like commercials). Things quickly go off the rails when the intern handling the restoration turns out to be obsessed with horror films and recuts the material to be genuinely terrifying. Since it’s local access, I leaned hard into the low-budget, DIY chaos of it all, which ultimately led to a fun, strange short film that embraces those limitations rather than hiding them.
Which Director inspires you the most?
I’ve been inspired by different directors at different times Milius, Scorsese, Coppola, Tarantino, Peckinpah, Nolan, and more recently PTA and Sean Baker. That said, Christopher Guest had a big subconscious influence on Impacted, especially the love of low-budget chaos and absurd humor.
What do you dislike about the world and what would you change?
Ha – honestly, we don’t need any more profit-obsessed shortsighted CEOs! When is enough enough?! We need more artists, storytellers and original voices. People who make the world more imaginative, thoughtful, hopeful and human. That’s the change I’d like to see.
How do you imagine cinema in 100 years?
I think passionate stories will still be told, hopefully by underdog storytellers 🙂 Formats and technology are evolving fast. Will IMAX-style screens become the new normal? Will our phones shoot an IMAX type image with an app? Hopefully, all these changes open the door for underdog voices with something amazing to say about our shared human journey.
What is your impression of WILD FILMMAKER?
I’m new to Wild Filmmaker, but I’m really enjoying it! It feels fresh and a great platform for interviews and connecting with like-minded cinema enthusiasts.
